Windows Server 2016 introduced a new feature called "Fault Domain Awareness". With Fault Domain Awareness the physical placement of devices on the node-, chassis- and rack level, can be properly defined. In the configuration a node can be assigned to a chassis and the chassis can be assigned to a rack. When Fault Domain Awareness is configured, S2D will spread the data intelligently across individual Fault Domains.

Effectively, when a node fails the data is already located on one or two other cluster nodes depending on the chosen protection level.